Recoiling reeling assemblies have an elongated element which is normally stored on a drum wheel. These recoiling reeling assemblies have a spring loaded mechanism for rewinding the elongated element onto the drum wheel after that element has been unwound.
For example, domestic garden hoses and electrical cords may be stored in this way, and are arranged to automatically tension a spring as they are unwound. The energy which is thus stored in the spring rewinds the elements onto the reel when the element is released.
These known reeling assemblies include a latching device which operates to retain the elongated element at a particular degree of extension which is chosen by the user.
In order to latch the elongated element when it has been unwound to the required degree of extension, the user slows the rate of unwinding and the device latches. To rewind the elongated element, the user applies sufficient tension to the elongated element to slightly unwind it and thus overcome the latching, and the spring-loaded mechanism rewinds the element back onto the drum. If the user wants to re-latch the elongated element at another position, the user slows the rate of rewinding by manually applying tension to the elongated element, and the latch device operates to again latch the elongated element at the desired extension.
At various elongated elements such as hoses, cables and ropes will require different rates of re-winding, the present invention aims to provide a suitable recoil rotation rate at which the latching device will operate.
It is a subsidiary aim of the present invention to provide a latch device which may be disabled by the user so that it does not operate regardless of how low the rewind speed is.